Aron retook his seat, allowing the next speaker to stand and introduce their preferred form of government. Once all of the proposals were in, the world leaders would vote to see which would be adopted.
President after president stood, some of them using every second of their allotted time and speaking passionately about the forms of government that they thought best while others simply announced their support of one of the previously mentioned suggestions. Alexander, of course, had strongly backed Aron’s proposal, which came as no surprise to anyone at all. Those who knew the situation already knew that Alexander was basically Aron’s sockpuppet, while those who didn’t know the situation, or only thought they did, assumed that Alexander was backing the much younger man due to having worked alongside him for a time and received much help and many benefits.
Esparia’s president, Jose Inez, also joined Alexander in supporting Aron. After all, why wouldn’t he? He was only the president thanks to Aron’s intervention in the Eden-Esparia War. And besides, it was Aron’s companies that were searching for and extracting the natural resources in their country, allowing them to profit without lifting a finger.
The other suggested governments were mostly truly ridiculous, but there were a few that also garnered strong support. President Zi Jinping’s communist utopia, Pope Frank’s theocracy, the Iranian caliphate, and President Trump’s suggested republic, which would be led by a senate comprised of an elected representative from each country.
Support for those suggested governments was mostly split along geographical and ideological lines. For example, Pope Frank’s theocracy was supported by Italy, Ireland, and the United Kingdom, while President Zi’s suggested communist utopia was supported by most of Southeast Asia. One odd exception was “President Putin”, who was wholeheartedly throwing his support behind Aron’s imperial government despite running a communist country of his own.
But by and large, most of the spoken support was given to President Trump’s suggestion, prompting him to display his signature smug smirk.
“Ladies and gentlemen,” President Nazarbayev banged his gavel, “we have a number of proposed governments to choose from. One of them needs to be selected by unanimous vote, so let’s begin the process.”
Everyone except for Pope Frank groaned. The government selection process would be run almost exactly like a Papal Conclave, and the pope had already gone through that process once before.
Aron stood and cleared his throat. “President Nazarbayev, may I have the floor for a moment?”
“Certainly, Mr. Michael. What do you need?” the temporary chairman respectfully said.
“I’d just like to take a moment before we move on to the voting process that will likely change the voting process,” Aron explained.
The Kazakhstanian president thought for a moment, then said, “Please make it brief.”
Aron thanked him, then began, “What I wanted to say is....”
…….
“I’d really like to know how the boy will salvage the situation and wrest power from the rest of the world’s leaders,” Herschel Rothschild mused. He was in his study with his wife, both of them glued to the television screen as they watched their future son-in-law’s performance and trying to predict how all the twists and turns would play out.
“Is he ballsy enough to threaten them in front of the rest of the world, live? No, he’s smarter than that. He should well know that a public threat would make it impossible to control the masses even if it gets him what he wants.
“Then maybe he’s threatened them beforehand? No, that would still be too obvious. Nearly 90% of the people in the room have already signaled their support of the democratic republic proposed by Trump. So they would never be able to convince people that there was no shady backroom dealing going on if they were to flip-flop so suddenly.”
“Do you think there’s any possibility of the world ever thinking he didn’t manipulate the leaders into voting under duress?” Virginia Rothschild asked her husband, who was still muttering to himself.
“I don’t think so,” he replied. “Any vote that ends with an imperial government will be assumed to have been cast under duress, so the constitution they’re working hard to write will be quite weak.”
Herschel continued wracking his brains, but there was no scenario he could imagine that would allow Aron to legitimately seize power.
……
Netizens seemed to have arrived at the same conclusion as well; nobody thought that Aron stood a chance, so even the flame wars and meme floods quieted down as they waited to see what Aron had to say. As for the few netizens still commenting on the process, they were all essentially just coming up with the likeliest method Aron had used to strongarm the other leaders into supporting him to the imperial throne.
……
“Good luck, boss. I’m rooting for you!” A man in a fitted suit and glasses was sitting at a bar, watching the summit on the televisions mounted above the liquor shelves. The ice in the drink in front of him shifted and clinked against the side of the glass, the drink itself going unheeded as the man’s attention had been wholly riveted on the broadcast since it had begun.
The bartender took the ignored drink away and began pouring another. It was obvious that it wasn’t the first time she had refreshed the drink for the handsome man sitting on the other side of the bar from her station. She expertly dropped three perfectly cubical pieces of ice into a short glass and poured two fingers of Glenlivet Founder’s Reserve over the neatly stacked ice cubes, then laid a napkin on the bar in front of the man and set his new drink on it.
“Oh come on, Zak. You’re killin me here! This is the best scotch we’ve got and you’re just... just wasting it!” she grumbled at the man. “You’d better pay up, bro. My tips can’t cover this much sacrilege against the finest drink on god’s green earth!”
The man blinked and focused his gaze on his sister, behind the bar across from him. “Don’t worry,” he waved his hand dismissively, “I get paid plenty good over at GAIA Tech.”
He fished out his wallet and handed a credit card to his sister. “Just open a tab.”
“It’s not the money! It’s the... the blatant sacrilege! See this?” She shook the bottle of single-malt scotch whisky in his face. “This is the nectar of the gods, bro! It’s the best of the good stuff, and you’re just... you’re just wasting it by ignoring it!”
The bickering siblings were interrupted by a short man in jeans and a faded t-shirt. “You work for GAIA?” he spat through clenched teeth. “You work for that bastard!?”
Zak blinked. “Yes, why?”
“That asshole cost me EVERYTHING!” the man shouted in Zak’s face. “I’d been working so hard and invested every last penny I had into my company, but that shitstain bankrupted me!”
Zak’s expression chilled, and even his sunny sister seemed disturbed. Zak wiped the spray from his face and asked, “And who are you?”
“Leonardo da Silva, former CEO of AgSpace agricultural company,” the man puffed out his chest and replied. “Who’s asking?”
“Mohammed Zakariya Talukdar, team lead on the GAIA OS accessibility team.”
Leonardo da Silva clenched his fist and, without another word, swung a wide haymaker at the head of Zak, who was sitting down and couldn’t dodge the incoming punch.
Zak blinked, then stood up, towering over the much shorter man who had only been speaking “face to face” with him when he was seated. He puffed out his chest and, in a deep voice, growled, “What the fuck was that for!?”
“You work for the devil! That makes you just as bad as him!” Leonardo spat, swinging a punch at Zak’s diaphragm. He had recently been taking martial arts classes in preparation for his ultimate revenge against the devil that had driven him into bankruptcy. “You devils all deserve to DIE!” he screamed, spraying spittle on Zak’s face.
Zak’s sister, Aisha, reached under the bar and pulled out the “beatin’ stick”, then slammed it on the top of the bar and shouted, “Knock it the fuck off! You—” she pointed the bat at the short, black-haired Brazilian man, “—get the fuck out of my bar! You’re not welcome here anymore!”
The short ex-CEO came to his senses and raised his hands as he backed away from the bar, muttering something under his breath about the end times and devils, then turned and ran out the door.
Aisha put the bat away and heaved a sigh. “Bro, your boss may be a good guy to you, but....” She shook her head and sighed again. “He’s kind of a megalomaniac.”
“He’s a good man, little sis, and he’s going to change the world,” Zak countered with the beginnings of a fanatical gleam in his eye.
……..
“Due to the format of the summit, the time it will take to pass Article II will lead to unacceptable delays. Thus, I will now use one of my remaining demands from the surrender accord to pass my proposal without amendment.”
